CLASSROOM REVEAL

In my July Favorites post I told you guys I was changing jobs and heading to public school to teach third grade. Now that school has started and I’ve gotten into the swing of things (kind of), I’d like to share the makeover I gave my classroom.

The Before

I came into the classroom after the Beautiful, wood floors had been waxed maybe one too many times, so my classroom was in a bit of disarray. Please forgive the atrocious state of the room with the ladders and pile of literally everything in the middle of the room.  The floors look wet. They are so dark and lacquered within an inch of their beautiful lives. The hallways are a lighter color, but still a lot of varnish there too. It is such a charming building, and I love that it is a place that has educated many, many people. I can’t imagine how many teachers have been in just this one classroom. I love that it’s a building with so much history. I do think Nicole Curtis needs to take a trip down to Alabama and come feature my school on Rehab Addict. She could make this place amazing!The picture below shows how bad the paint was peeling off. It really needed a face lift.
Okay, so I have to say that bright blue is one of my favorite colors. I mean, don’t y’all remember Carrie Bradshaw’s apartment in the Sex and the City movie…perfection. Also, my teenage bedroom was four walls of that same lime green as the cabinet. I love bright colors, but I wasn’t feeling it when I walked into the classroom. So I decided to head to Pinterest to find some inspiration. I saw this image and new right away that I was headed in a farmhouse direction. Of course Chip and Jo would do something as adorable as awnings and window boxes INSIDE the classroom.My search led to many more classrooms with a farmhouse theme. You can check those out on my Classroom Ideas Pinterest Board if you’re a fellow Pinterest nut like I am.

I started to get a vision of what I wanted, and with the help of my parents and my husband, the room was painted and things were on their way! I decided to go with a neutral palette for the room and accent with mostly yellow, but also some green. I used Kilz brand paint in Starched Linen for the walls and Kilz paint again for the built-in cabinet and free standing cubbies but in the color White by Glidden. All the paint came from our local Walmart. I mention the Kilz brand because, Holy Moly, did it cover those bright colors well! The walls only took two coats, but I did give the cubbies and the cabinet three coats. For the black trim, we just used a little quart of Rust-Oleum in Glossy Black for touch-ups.

You can see that the built-in cabinet has been painted many times in it’s day.  I can totally understand painting a built-in, but when I opened this thing and saw the luscious wood inside, my heart sank. I can’t believe how gorgeous it is. Why would anyone want to paint that?!?! My dad did say he would try to get the outside back to what it was originally, but there just wasn’t any time. Maybe next summer…right Dad? 🙂

The After

Let’s start at the entrance. Out in the hall we have a Hollywood theme. Back to Pinterest I went for inspiration. I pinned so many ideas on my Bulletin Board Ideas board, so feel free to visit and see them all. My mom wanted to know what I was thinking about doing, and when I showed her the picture of the marquis I liked, she said she had everything and would gladly make it for me. Bless you, Mama! I love how it turned out! And, bonus, none of my students forget where my room is because of it.
Now come on in.

The director’s chair came from Mrs. Ellinor who was at that giant yard sale that goes on for miles. (I can’t remember the official name.) Mom told her to be on the look out for one, and I prayed she’d find it! She must have too, because she did!! Thanks for finding this for me, Mrs. Ellinor, and bringing it back home! It’s so fun and easy to move out of the way when I need them to see the entire board.

The rug is from At Home and makes the room feel a little warmer and welcoming. Mom and Dad scored that one for me one afternoon. I love it.  Okay, let’s talk for a second about the SHIPLAP bulletin board paper! I saw it on Pinterest and just assumed I’d never get any. I saw it on Amazon, but I thought it was a bit expensive, so I decided I’d just use regular paper in black, green, or yellow. But a trip to Davie’s in Montgomery made my dreams come true! I love it so much! I’m trying to find a way to make it work in my house. 🙂  The cubbies look so great painted white. I know they’ll get so dirty by the end of school, but I just love how bright and clean they look right now. The sunflowers are those tissue paper pom poms from Dollar Tree flattened down. I made the rest of the flowers from bulletin board paper. My boarder is napkin squares stapled very close to each other. You just buy about 250 cocktail sized napkins, unfold them, and cut each napkin into four individual squares. I suggest watching Netflix while you do it. Haha! 😉 I just wanted something visually interesting, and when I saw this idea from Mrs. Sheila, who retired last year, I knew that I had borrow her idea.  I found these precious numbers on a shiplap background on Teachers Pay Teachers. They were so cute, and being that they were shiplap, I had to say yes. And just a quick before and after of the built in cabinet.

Before AfterIt sure is an absolute delight to walk into a space that makes me happy. I want to thank my family again for helping me make this happen. I’m so grateful they are willing to help take on projects that I come up with and indulge my creative side. It was a lot of fun getting it all done, and I couldn’t have done it without them. To my fellow teachers who are in the throws of the first few weeks of school, I raise my coffee mug to you! Lord knows we are tired and need all the caffeine to get us going in the morning and sometimes keep us going in the afternoons. I know they say there’s no tired like end of the year teacher tired, but beginning of the year teacher tired is real and worse. I wish you all a wonderful school year. I’d love to hear how your first week has gone in the comments.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend, everyone, and thanks for stopping by today!